Your first error was going to a website

26: unsubscribe from the email promos that the site automatically signed you up to even though you didn't check the Subscribe to newsletter box, which requires you to log into the site and find and uncheck all the boxes in the "contact settings".
- 26a: Note that they will simply add more categories over time and helpfully subscribe you to each of the new ones whether you ever visit the site again or not.
- Unsubscribe? You mean report spam
  
  Unsubscribe is for real suckers only. When someone clicks that I always imagine some goon elbowing the guy next to him and saying something like, "look Keith we got another" unsubscriber" over here!" With a big goofy grin on his face.
  
  Report spam? You mean deactivate single-use email.
  
  exactly. if i didnt purposefully subscribe to it, its SPAM.

Missed the step towards the end were you have to switch browser and restart the whole process because "Firefox not supported" or you've an extension that's a bit overzealous on blocking the checkout popup window.
- Blocked an ad that fucked up the css so dramatically that the checkout button is now permanently stuck at -10% of viewport.
  
  I tried to order chicken teriyaki so it would be ready for my wife to pick up en route home. Website requires a login. Make it. It doesn't log in after creating the login, so log in again. Password wrong. Reset password. Finally get in. Get to last step and there's no button to send the order. Fortunately, I'd wasted so much time that my wife was already there standing in line.
  I assume it's just formatted for mobile, but when I'm sitting at my computer, I'm going to use it, it's always faster. Except when it doesn't work.
- Or the page which doesn't allow an ad blocker

"tHiS wEbSiTe Is BeTtEr In ThE aPp!"
- Bold of you to assume people know the difference between an app and a website.
  
  The App:
  One WebBrowser component.
  A straw to slurp all your location and contact data.
  Annoying notifications.
  
  I was astonished when I first learned that hardly anyone enters web addresses anymore, then it made sense when I realized that almost everyone browses on their phones and uses the app versions of whatever they scroll, which is really only going to be somewhere between three and a dozen sites anyway, people don't just "surf the internet" anymore, they scroll content aggregators and social media feeds. People hate making choices or having control, they want to turn off their mind and just be fed sensations and experiences.
  Because of this most people don't really know HOW websites and networks work, when I explain things like how cookies work, how to refresh a page, how to navigate to specific parts of a website by changing the address, how to search the web for alternatives, etc. I get looked at like either an annoying nerd or some kind of wizard.

Don’t forget that it saved all of your credit card info except for the secret code. then you search for the card and find the stupid code and enter it and then it tells you that there was an unknown error and to try a new card.

They forgot the last step: delete the promo emails from the company you never signed up for
- The worst thing is that you gave them the permission to send emails to you, but you did not even notice it.
  If you give some information to any for profit company you can be sure they will use that information and if you decline the permits they are going to keep asking until you eventually miss click.
  For example if you fill shopping basked, but abandon it after filling your information they can contact you once as "a friendly reminder" about the cart and they can keep that information legally for few weeks until they must anomize the data. And if you at some point clicked something where you accept the marketing permits they can keep that information "as long as the company thinks it is reasonable to keep and/or revelant information for their operation."
  Source: Im part of the problem. Atleast for now.
  
  The worst thing is that you gave them the permission to send emails to you, but you did not even notice it.
  Note: there are a lot of services now that will sneakily get your signature/acceptance without you realizing it. The latest one I noticed was at the pharmacy, where you normally sign for your prescription, it now has one or more options that pop up before you sign for your actual medicine, and if you read what you're signing you see it's permission to text you special offers and promotions.
  ALWAYS READ WHAT YOU ACCEPT, IF YOU DON'T KNOW, DON'T SIGN IT. If you're worried or pressured, just ask someone. We can't keep discarding our rights and privacy because we're worried about people in line behind us or worried how much time you're going to lose at least SKIMMING the user licence agreement. You can save yourself a lot of junk and hassle if you at least make sure the accept buttons and signature fields are actually for what you want.
  
  I am glad I am using proton. I never give my real email to any website and create an alias for every website. That way, when I ever receive a spam email, I know exactly which company sold my data and I can turn that alias off permanently.

How people can deal with internet without adblockers like uBlock is just baffling. Not only ads, but also all the cookie banners and phone app popups and other crap. uBlock will filter all this shit out so you just use the website without junk and annoyances.
I've used the original Windscribe back when it was still a regular x86 app that acted like a local proxy and would filter out ads and banners. That was early 2000s iirc. Even back then I couldn't stand all this crap. Today I can't imagine browsing without uBlock or at minimum with DNS filtering which can't apply cosmetic filters or more advanced rules.
- AdNauseam. It clicks all the adverts. Yes, this is actively malicious behaviour. No, I don't care.
  
  Malicious against advertisers, beneficial to the site you're visiting.
  That's a win-win in the desolate place we call the internet today.
- Just want to post this here for anyone not aware... uBlock "medium" mode. Kind of an unadvertised feature that has to be enabled in a strangely obscure way (I think they want to make sure you're not a complete idiot).
  Still, pretty easy to set up, and much more protection than the default (but also not nearly as frustrating as "hard" mode or whatever they call it). Basically, most sites you visit are going to be broken the first time you go, but you enable elements you need for the site to load, then save those settings for that domain. Takes about 30 seconds or so once you know what you're doing and you only need to do it once per domain. Basically, I keep 1st and 3rd-party scripts off completely most of the time. It's relatively rare that I absolutely need to enable 1st party scripts on a page for it to load.
  It's kind of like uBlock + noscript learning mode. The element zapper is clutch as well, but that's not unique to medium mode or anything.
- DNS level ad blocks have been a huge game changer for me. When I play games at home, no ads. Then when I go out and play those games, I forget that they have ads.
  
  For me setting up Android phone without it. Installed some app and got bombarded by all the ads and shit. Something I just don't even know on mine.
- Windscribe was important because every bit of bandwidth saved mattered. Less so with 2.5gb fiber connections to home.
  
  I actually didn't care so much about bandwidth back then even though 56K modem was ass. It was the ad banners that drew me nuts. Especially since that was the era of flashing and blinking GIF and Adobe Flash banners. I got 1Mbit ADSL a bit later and that's when it was even less important since bandwidth was unlimited. Banners were still there tho and were just as annoying.

#2/9/14
you forgot that you need to select more options, scroll down, read every box carefully to make sure on doesnt mean off and off doesnt mean on, make sure you dont hit the button that ignores your choices and turns everything on anyways......
i fucking hate what this has turned into.
- I just ublock every cookie screen and navigate in incognito mode so cookies publicity cooki s will have zero chances of actually getting read.
  Not as it really matters. As most of my advertisement profile doesn't come from some random site cookies but from phone espionage.

We have driver's licence as an app in norway. I was on my way into a pub where I was asked by a bouncer to show ID. I forgot my physical wallet with physical ID, so the dance started:
Unlock phone.
Find app.
App requires national login. Enter personal number (Norwegian SSN)
National login has 2FA via another app. Open that to confirm.
National login requires password. My password is in a password manager, so I open that.
Password manager requires password.
and 2FA.
Acquire password and scramble back to the app that required password for national log on.
Complete login so I can show that I am 33 years old, which is over the required age of 18.
In reality, the bouncer just gave up on me at around step 5 and let me in.
- There are just things that should be physical things.
  IDs and fucking buttons in cars please. Holy fuck please can we not do the IPAD thing in cars. Please God.
  
  And on cooking stuff!
  Long click to select stove element
  Phew now it's on full power...
  
  It is an physic thing, OP just forgot it at home.
- Yesterday, I was on the train and the lady checking the tickets at first walked past me without checking mine. After more people had gotten on, she made her route back down the train, when she asked me, if she had checked mine – hmm, she must've checked mine – so, she was already about to walk on and out of reflex, I said that she had actually skipped me before.
  Felt a bit silly to then get out my ticket and show it to her, since I clearly wouldn't have told her to ckeck me, if I didn't have a valid ticket. Kind of same energy as with your bouncer, like you wouldn't have all this stuff on your phone and spend the time trying to get into it, if it won't lead to anything.
- Either he was being a dick (fairly likely all bounces are) or you have a really good moisturizing regimen because there's no way that a 33-year-old would look like they're under 18.
  
  I definitely do not look like an 18-year old. But I was entering with a group consisting of a variety of looks, so it was just a thing to check everyone.
- That sounds like a 60 second thing at most. None of it is worse than having to drive back home for your wallet.
  
  In Norway, it has been a long tradition to do as many drinks as possible at home before heading to the bars, due to steep prices in bars. So I was pretty "beautiful" at that point, which does not help with running passwords and 2FAs

cloudflare decides it doesnt like your user agent or IP or any of a myriad of other factors and denies you access completely, order has been cancelled

Cookie dismisser extension, bitwarden for passwords and 2FA codes, uBlock origin for annoying popups that can't be removed with DNS blocker directly.
There are ways to reduce the pain somewhat, but they shouldn't be necessary in first place.
(Well, hoomans and passwords are an issue that can't be solved easily, but the push for passkeys has been a nice nudge in a more secure and more usable alternative.)
- You don’t need an extra extension for the cookie notices. Just use uBlock Original for that:
  Under Filter lists enable "Cookie notices"
  
  Does it just disable them or does it click on decline first?
- I like to tell people that using uBlock origin means the computer doesn't have to render images and text in adds, so it is actually more environmentally friendly to have it installed than running the browser raw.
  It's a thin argument, but I'm happy to see that some people have jumped on because of it.
- Consent-o-matic is a life-saver
- What browser are you using? Chrome pushed it's new extension requirements and killed ublock. Firefox just dropped a bomb about selling personal info I think.
  
  Firefox, naturally. The personal info stuff is still unfolding and being clarified. Will switch to Librefox or Waterfox if stuff gets bad.
- what the fuck do you mean hoomans
  
  It means you're an uncultured swine it's never seen an episode of Star Trek.
  
  Caught my eye too and it feels eerily reminiscent of the alt-right “coomer” and “consoom” kind of vocabulary, although I stress the word “feel”

Missing step of CAPTCHA asking you to click on motorcycle images, only for you to fail at least twice
- Me just trying to fucking pay a utility bill:
  "Honey, could you come in here and tell me if this looks like the edge of crosswalk just visible behind that car? I have one chance left and can't mess this up!"
- Or writing the exact characters in the obfuscated image only to be told it's not what you seen.
- Oh my. This was my yesterday trying to sign up on Meetup.
  First it was click crosswalks. Then stairs. Then motorcycles. Then the sign up failed. 5 minutes of my life so I can RSVP some stupid ass event.
  What a shit experience.
- Lifehack: Use the audio prompt and just put in ANY similar number of random words you hear. It fuzzes AI training data at same time. Works every time.

Don't worry. Soon you'll be able to subscribe to a service where an AI will just order products you don't actually want for you.

Alternative to 7 they have this stupid magic email login where you cannot set a password but have to go to your mails everyone you need to login
- I had one the other day, choose to login with password or the magic email link. I know my password, let me in fucker. Oh no, you still have to go to your email and click on some link to verify it’s really you.

I remember back in the day we had a popup blocker. Now we are bombarded by popups, but inside the website instead of new windows. The most annoying part is the times delay on them. When the page is loaded, you want to click on a link, but a fraction of a second before you click a promotion pops up and you click on that. Or the Google ads when searching. Click result.... Oh no, the ads loaded in, I clicked on an ad instead. Fuck you.
The amount of effort you need to put in to get the info you want. So annoying! They try so hard to keep you on their website as well. When I want to know a shortcut in excel:
search for the shortcut
missclick an ad
try again
find page with info
close cookies
close promotion
need to login for info, go back to Google and try again
close cookies
close promotion
start reading...
info about what excel is used for
history of excel
story about the many shortcuts excel has
close popup for newsletter
story about different key on keaybord for windows and Apple
story about why you would need this action you're searching for
buildup to explanation what the actual shortcut is
close promotion
close another newsletter pupup
finally the shortcut you're searching for. FFS
- I think most of this could be avoided if you used ublock origin
  
  PSA. It's disabled on Chrome now. Switch to Firefox (still looking for a better alternative myself with recent FF news though.)
  It's something I've been putting off. But chrome is unusable now. So many ads. I'm sure there is a workaround but just like leaving reddit it's a good time for me to find a chrome alternative.
  
  I have a Pi Hole, Proton vpn with ad blocking and Vivaldi browser with ad blocking built in, but that's not enough apparently
- Oh I know, I'll skip all of this trouble and just ask AI instead!
  The AI hallucinates and gives you a shortcut that doesn't actually exist
- I remember back in the day we had a popup blocker
  Wait what happened to pop up blockers in your mind?
  
  Those were for new windows popping up. Not built-in newsletter or promotion popups AFAIK.

Website wants to know your location
- Yeah that shits annoying. If you have something you need my location for, I will give you my zip code and pick from "nearby" on a map myself.

Realize that you havn't ordered there in a while and you've moved since the last time you ordered, you updated your billing address but it didn't update the shipping address and the product is now headed toward your old house.

Step 4 is a bit optimistic. Usually when I search something there are 30 products of what I specifically don't want before finding the single listing of what I do want.
Recent example. Needed a 8v 1A transformer
Searched AC to AC 8v 1A
Every listing on the first 3 pages were universal AC to DC adaptors that didn't have an 8v setting. the dials all went 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 12.
- Yes, e commerce sites which want revenue, developed a search that worked and then broke it to give you less relevant results, hoping you will go to the competition.
  It is well known that companies have revenue. Line must not go up!
- You may have already figured this out, but a variac would fit the bill.

I work in web dev and it kills me every time to set up this stupid UX.
Honestly, this biggest problem is these damn pop ups actually work for conversions. If people would stop filling the pop up forms on the sites they would fade to obscurity but for every annoyed dev who closes the pop up asking for an email, there is 10 normies who give up their email or create an account or complete a purchase.
Static email sign up forms in the header or footer of a site are lucky to see a 1% conversion. The average pop up conversion rate in 2024 was 11%.. The highest preforming pop ups in this analysis had a 43% conversion rate, that is INSANE for web conversions. And those stupid gamification spin the wheel pop ups that I personally hate the most, have a 13% conversion.

20b : shipping is abusively eating up the low price
- 20C. Realize this is not the best price on the product. 20D1.
  
  For i in range (your_breaking_point): if i == your_breaking_point: break Return to step 1.
  
  20D2. Get an email saying “You forgot something in your cart”
  
  I am compelled to optimize this code:
  python
  
  pass
- While it sucks, I think that's better actually. Let me cook lol
  Websites that ship for free have to factor in the shipping into the item price.
  Which means that if you order a lot of items at once rather than separately, you get no reward for being more sustainable.
  Shipping costs ensure that people don't make inefficient, single-item orders unless they really need to.
  
  The shitty idea is that you have to make an account and lots of jazz before they tell how much shipping is.
  Also, instead of 25€ for the product and 8€ for shipping, surprise!! the 18€ product magically needs a special courier for 15€ to ship it.
  
  waits to order stuff until there's a few things needed
  free shipping not available anyways unless you hit minimum order of 50.-
  proceed to order 10 things at once
  each thing gets shipped in a separate package, on separate dates…
  even the 20x 1cm M3 screws that you originally needed come in a cardboard parcel, by themselves
  packages keep arriving randomly at your place for the next 5-10 days, leaving you with a pile of cardboard

What's literally traumatizing are the scumbag sites that wait a little bit before showing you an email popup.
Like, I'll be reading something and then BLAM! I'm immediately taken out of my focus and have to, for the 1 billionth time (and counting!), refuse to give them an email address.
Fuck everyone who encourages this bullshit. Fuck everyone who actually gives them emails. It's likely an extremely low percentage of users, but that's all that it takes to ruin things for the rest of us.
Scumbag sites like that are actively contributing to lowering everyone's standards and making us get used to a 'new normal.'
- it’s likely an extremely low percentage of users
  its not, its actually a pretty high percentage, the conversion rate of pop up email form to static forms in the footer or header are like night and day. Static email sign up forms are lucky to see a 1% conversion. The average pop up conversion rate for emails pop up with incentive (like a discount code) in 2024 was 7%.
  If people stopped filling out the pop up forms they would go away, but people still continue to bite so they live on.
- I mean, these "scumbag sites" include everything from the NYT to X, The Everything App.

Sure, at step 17 you are certain it's showing ngwt14 but it fails then takes you to an almost twenty year old "identify the motorcycles" with 8 pictures of a partial wheel... or is it a bicycle? And do they mean plural as in for the whole thing or in each image?
- The latest one is where they show you a picture of it deformed owl and ask you to find all other deformed owls. It's great because humans are really good identifying pictures of distorted animals, it's definitely something we evolve to do.

17a. Reject prompt to set up a pass key.
- Take my upvote because you made me laugh; however, in all reality pass key is more secure, and should be used when available.
- Passkeys aren't so bad. Just switch to a password manager that stores them for you, preferably a self-hosted one if you're technically inclined.

Fuck this is accurate

Using webmail can be avoided, but agreed on the rest.
PS: It gets worse when you use a script blocker and have to figure out which scripts are needed per website.
- That jumped out to me as well. Even using something like Thunderbird with GMail (even though you really should try moving somewhere that respects your privacy) has such a better feel to it.
  
  Yes, exactly. I'm still in that intermediate position myself. I'm using Thunderbird and K9-Mail as clients for my Hotmail Account (Microsoft).
  It's seems like so much work to move away from the email account I signed up for some 20 years ago, so I've still shied away from doing it so far. At least I started using a password manager a few years ago, so by now I have a list of services, that would require updating.

Don’t forget to reject notifications.
- And sometimes deny location access.

Who knew Yahoo! in its prime would be peak Internet.
- Web rings were peak Internet. And files being found via FTP search.

Not sure I'd prefer the easy internet of the past though. I hope no one forgets websites used to store your password in plain text and just sent it to you if you forgot. Oh and password length? Any 4 characters will do! Buying online? Yeah just need those super secure 3 digits on the card please. There's a lot of unneeded fluff today like the promos and cookie disclaimers could have been handled at protocol level. But what is there for security is generally good change, even if it makes the process more complex.
- Ah yes, the "Private, simple or secure" web dilemma that will push everyone to embracing AI agents that will amplify the issues with the first three options.

Alternative to steps 6 through 17: refuse to use any webstore that doesn't allow for guest check-checkout.

I don't know how this happens, but it seems like so many damned websites are broken when it comes time for me to actually use them. This is becoming an almost daily issue. So not only do we have to navigate terrible UI/UX applications, we also have to deal with frequent outages and novel bugs.
Wish I was kidding.
Friday: I had to log into an HR website to update my contact info, my login information didn't work. The reset password link never sent me an email. Left a message with HR and still haven't heard back. Later that day: Wanted to redeem some credit card points, button takes me to a 3rd party side, 3rd party site redirects to a message that says "we're undergoing maintenance at this time please check back later".
Saturday: Tried to make an online appointment with my primary healthcare provider. The form would not accept my phone number, for some reason, it would not pass validation. Eventually got through, selected a time slot from the list of available spots, went to submit and got a message along the lines of "your provider is not available during this time, please try again." Later that day: Went to go read the news on one of the sites I have a paid subscription for. It hasn't asked me to login for awhile, but on Saturday it did. No biggie, tried to sign in, but it kept giving me an error message about not having permission to view the site.
Sunday: Got a recall notice for my car last week. Went in to schedule the fix with the closest dealership. Went through a multi-page webform that took approximately 10 minutes to complete and then hit the submit button. Nothing happened. Clicked it again, thinking maybe it didn't register. Nothing. Tried once more, nothing. A few minutes later, my phone rang, it was an automated call from the dealership asking me to hold for the next available representative. Moments later, another incoming call from the dealership, I switch over, same automated call asking me to hold. Then it happened again, another incoming call from the dealership. I ended up waiting on hold for quite some time (20ish minutes???) with no response before I finally just ended all the calls because I have shit to do.
Today (Monday): Tried to sign up for some insurance. Selected a bunch of options using the "compare" feature and then clicked the button. Nothing happened, so I waited. After maybe a minute, a pop-up appeared to let me know I was signed out due to inactivity. I tried signing back in, and this time it asked me for a code that it claimed to have texted to my phone number. Still haven't gotten that text.
I wish I could say this is unusual, but it seems like a near constant now. What is up with this?
- It sounds familiar. "Wait let me quickly do this online and we can eat." Half an hour later: "OK I will finish this after dinner."

my methods for downloading content for offline perusal that interests me evolve constantly. some of us have been doing for this song and dance for decades, and \
if you want to know how to distribute controversial antifascist content, ask a porn addict
- meta/x/redittttt?
  delete

"New password must differ from your current active password"

wow that seems relatively simple given a purchase was made. usually it's at least 4 more pages and verifications and codes and promos

Imo it's bearable with the ublock and 'I still don't care about cookies' extensions (Firefox) now. I kinda get the anti-bot measures on pages... bots are a pain for every page owner.

2 seems simple, but every site uses a slightly different variation for opt-in, but every variant is based on your lizard brain being tempted to click accept. The sites that make you scroll through 938 'legitimate interest" partners to get the "reject all" option are particularly shit.
- Green button good, red button bad.
- Those sites are also breaking the law, by the way. Opting out has to be just as easy as opting in, otherwise it cannot be considered consent.

I know that 2FA is not that convenient, but it greatly improves security. Especially for users who use the same email password combination for multiple accounts

My first error was existing

I'm pretty sure we could make this into a satirical puzzle game.
\ You would defuse a connected bomb by remotely shutting it down through an awful mobile app.

But security tho! Security theater is actually super useful!

Yeah, I'm absolutely going to throw my laptop out of the window someday.

This hurts a lot

Actually last time, I clicked on the wrong button on Amazon and the item have been ordered in one click. Obviously that wasn't what I wanted to do and needed to cancel it which wasn't a one click action.

Not gonna lie, this ain't wrong.

Amazon: we saved your shit just click quick buy
I hate Amazon as much as everyone but they win because they make it easy and have good return policies and shipping. People care more about things being easy than being the cheapest.

Sharing screencaps from mastodon is acceptable, but only because it combats screencaps from twitter.
- That's what this community is for

We can thank GDPR for the cookie warnings.
Promos are legit enshittification.
Passkeys beat 2FA apps & enable passwordless.
Shipping & card info can be 1-time fill. A decent password manager with form filler takes the pain out of much of this. Federated identities also reduce some pain.

Just make a web browser standard for all of this this. I hate repeating myself.

IMAP and/or Authenticator skips step 8 to 14.
- How does an authenticator help here?
  
  Maybe autocorrection on "Authentik".